STEVENS POINT - Jim Hennelly could hardly believe it when he was working out at the Stevens Point Area YMCA this month and the staff wouldn't let him watch cable news.

"I said, 'Can I watch CNN?' And they said no. I said, 'OK, how about Fox?' And the girl was nice, but she said you can’t watch any national news broadcast," he recounted.

Hennelly is an 80-year-old retired Chicago city bus driver who lives in Plover, and he didn't like his TV access restricted.

"The reason they gave us is that it makes some people unhappy, or angry," he said, indignant at the whole idea.

A sprained foot had kept Hennelly away from the YMCA for a few months, so he didn't know the facility enacted the policy in the fall after an episode between two members got out of hand. In doing so, the Stevens Point YMCA joined a host of fitness centers around the country that are banning stations such as Fox News, CNN and MSNBC because the programs have become flash points in an intensely divisive political atmosphere.

Life Time Fitness, a chain based in Minnesota, decided last January that people working out at its 128 gyms in the U.S. and Canada could no longer watch those cable news programs.

Joe Seubert, associate executive director at the Stevens Point YMCA, noted that members still can watch whatever programs are available on the TV monitors attached to cardio machines. But on the bigger wall-mounted TVs viewed across the fitness room, he said, "we did censor some of those stations."

The YMCA team took action after one member berated another earlier in the fall, Seubert said, although he said he could not remember what TV program was showing at the time.

The offended member "was questioning why someone would watch that particular station, that 'filth' or that 'trash,'” Seubert said. "The person in front of the TV just felt, 'Did I really come to the Y, did I come to work out, to be attacked about what’s on the TV in front of me?'"

He said the YMCA's response included rescinding someone's membership, although he didn't say whose, and implementing the ban on cable news.

"We just simply took off the news. ... For consistency and not to take sides, we eliminated the news stations," he said. "All local channels are still available."

Life Time Fitness patrons working out on steppers such as these will no longer be able to follow the national cable news on their screens. WILLIAM ARCHIE/Detroit Free Press Patrons work out on steppers while watching monitor at the Lifetime Fitness in Commerce Township. Monday, December 22, 2008(Photo11: WILLIAM ARCHIE, Detroit Free Press)

Hennelly said he had been a member for over a year, and it was the first time he was unable to watch the national TV news while he worked out. He was incredulous that people would be so offended by what others are watching that they would get the stations banned.

"That’s like me going in there to watch Green Bay and the Bears are on, and screaming 'Turn those damn Bears off!," he said. "It’s crazy."

Seubert, for his part, said he was not thrilled with the need for the new policy.

"We want people to use the facility and be active," Seubert said. "But again, people’s biases and feelings would get very heightened at various times.

"From a personal standpoint, it’s a shame that we can’t voice our differences and opinions in a positive environment. As a society and as a culture, I think those are things we need to take a look at internally, in ourselves."

All Hennelly wants to look at, he said, is CNN, or Fox, or MSNBC.

"I got so pissed off I looked at a soccer game," Hennelly said, "which I could care less about."